Organization Setup

Deploy pair across your organization. By the end of this guide, you will have a custom Knowledge Base package that can be distributed to every team, ensuring consistent AI-assisted development practices organization-wide.

Before starting, complete the general quickstart — install pair-cli and the Knowledge Base.

Set Up the Central Knowledge Base

Start with the default pair Knowledge Base in your central repository, then customize it:

Organization-Specific Guidelines

Add or modify files in .pair/knowledge/guidelines/ to reflect your organization's standards:

• Code design — naming conventions, design patterns, review criteria
• Testing strategy — coverage targets, testing frameworks, test categories
• Security — authentication patterns, data handling, compliance requirements
• Architecture — approved patterns, integration standards, API conventions

Standard Adoption Templates

Pre-fill .pair/adoption/ with organization-wide defaults:

• Tech stack — approved languages, frameworks, and libraries
• Infrastructure — approved cloud providers, CI/CD pipelines
• Way of working — branching strategy, review process, quality gates

Teams can extend these defaults with project-specific decisions. The adoption registry uses add behavior — it never overwrites existing decisions, so team customizations are preserved.

Package Your Custom KB

Once your KB is ready, package it for distribution:

pair-cli package

This creates a distributable ZIP with a manifest.json containing version, checksums, and a file list. The package includes everything in .pair/ — your customized guidelines, templates, and adoption defaults.

Distribute via GitHub Releases

Publish the package as a GitHub Release artifact:

1. Tag a release in your central KB repository
2. Attach the ZIP artifact from pair-cli package
3. CI can automate this with SHA256 checksum generation

Teams install your custom KB by pointing pair-cli to your release:

pair-cli install --source https://github.com/your-org/your-kb/releases/latest/download/kb.zip

Team Onboarding

When a team adopts pair with your organization's KB:

1. Install — pair-cli install --source <your-kb-url> downloads and installs the custom KB
2. Customize — the team adds project-specific adoption decisions (tech stack, architecture)
3. Develop — every AI assistant reads the combined KB (org standards + team decisions)
4. Update — pair-cli update refreshes the KB when the organization publishes a new version

Version Coordination

CLI version maps to KB version. When you release a new KB version:

• Teams run pair-cli update to get the latest guidelines
• Organization standards propagate automatically
• Team-specific adoption files are preserved (never overwritten)

Asset Registries

The CLI uses five asset registries with specific behaviors:

The distinction between mirror (sync everything) and add (preserve existing) is key: organization guidelines update automatically, but team decisions are never overwritten.

Compliance and Governance

With a centralized KB, your organization gets:

• Consistent standards — every team follows the same guidelines
• Auditable decisions — adoption files and ADRs document every architectural choice
• Controlled updates — KB versioning ensures teams use approved standards
• Flexible customization — teams extend (never conflict with) organization defaults

Next Steps

• Enterprise Adoption tutorial (~60 min) — guided rollout walkthrough for organizations
• Understand how the Knowledge Base structure supports customization
• Learn how Skills automate the development lifecycle across teams
• Explore Agent Integration for multi-tool support